Tuesday of week 6 in Ordinary Time, or The Seven Holy Founders of the Servite Order

Office of Readings | Morning Prayer | Evening Prayer | Night Prayer | Mass(The Seven Holy Founders of the Servite Order)

Ash WednesdayOffice of Readings | Morning Prayer | Evening Prayer | Night Prayer | MassAsh Wednesday

Lent is the forty-day period of preparation for Easter, which is marked by prayer, fasting and almsgiving.How exactly those forty days are calculated has varied across the world and at different times in history. In Jerusalem in the fourth century, Lent was 40 fasting days, but those were spread over eight weeks because Saturday and Sunday were not fast days. The way we calculate Lent today, Sundays are not fast days, so Lent spreads over six and a half weeks, which means that it begins on Ash Wednesday.We all remember Ash Wednesday because of the ashes. They commemorate the ‘repentance in sackcloth and ashes’ which is a sign of mourning and penance throughout the Old Testament. We go up in turn to the altar and have ashes rubbed into our foreheads as the priest says some variant of ‘Remember, man, that thou art dust, and unto dust thou shalt return.’ This mark stays on us through the rest of the day, like a Hindu caste mark, unless prudence or fear make us wipe it off.Being reminded that we are dust does not mean being told we are worthless. What we are being told is that our value comes not from ourselves, but through us, from God. If people were light-bulbs, we would find it easy to understand this. A light-bulb does not produce light. It cannot. What a light-bulb can do (and a working light-bulb does do) is take the energy given to it from outside, and shine brightly by accepting and transforming what it has received. If we understand the true source of value, we avoid the perils of both pride and depression. If we shine brightly in this world, that does not come from within ourselves. It is because we deal faithfully with whatever power we have been given us – greater power or lesser power – as in the parable of the talents, the two good servants take what their master has given them and do something with it.Ash Wednesday falls on a Wednesday in most parts of the world, but not quite all. In Milan, the ashes are imposed on the first Sunday of Lent. In Vietnam, the celebration of the lunar New Year occasionally collides with Ash Wednesday, in which case Ash Wednesday is slightly postponed. For instance, in 2026 Ash Wednesday in Vietnam is celebrated on the Friday.(Day of Venerating Ancestors (Vietnam))

Thursday after Ash WednesdayOffice of Readings | Morning Prayer | Evening Prayer | Night Prayer | Mass(Day of Sanctifying Works (Vietnam))

The third day of the Vietnamese New year celebration is concerned with what we are going to do with this new year which has been given us. It is a celebration of human work. As Christians we do not find fulfilment by self-absorbed self-contemplation. We do.The First Reading tells how God put man in the Garden of Eden to cultivate it and take care of it. In the Second Reading Paul boasts to the Ephesians how he has never asked them for money to support him in his preaching: when he needed money, he sat down and made tents. The Gospel is one of the most terrifying of all: the Parable of the Talents, which tells of the terrible fate of anyone who is given talents and uses them purely for sitting around and feeling safe.(Bl. Alvarez of Cordoba OP ( - 1430))